Disaster at sea

When the Napoli foundered off the Devon coast the calamity was blamed on a storm. But was she seaworthy in the first place? Jack Grimstone and Brendan Montague report

It was 10.30am when Forbes Duthie heard a loud bang, but it seemed like nothing out of the ordinary for a big ship in a storm. So the 20-year-old cadet from near Inverness lay in his bunk a little longer, then went for a shower.

A few minutes later Duthie was in no doubt about what had happened to the MSC Napoli. A Turkish crewmate came rushing up the steps shouting at him to pull on his lifejacket as the ship was breaking up and the captain had ordered everyone off.

The noise that had woken Duthie was the opening of jagged vertical cracks on either side of the hull of the 63,000- ton container ship. The boat had effectively snapped and seawater was gushing into the engine room faster than the pumps could cope, immobilising the vessel and leaving it at the mercy of the storm.